The word bed looks like a bed

Honestly, it took me a second (or two) before I realized what this meant. Shame on me.

Actually, I was thinking of something else when I saw this sentence.

Sometimes I'm just wondering... Why is a chair called a chair? Why is a table a table? Why do we call a mirror a mirror? Why do we all know what is meant when the another person is talking about a bottle? How did the term come to be? Who decided upon the name and how did he come up with it?

Just some questions crossing my mind.

Will I ever know the answer? Probably not. Does it make any sense to think about it? Probably not. It is like the question whether a tree falling in a forest still makes a sound when there is no one to hear it. Or what came first: the chicken or the egg. Or the discussion whether a glass is half full or half empty.

The mystique of language

Language is a complex process or system - or whatever you would call it. Acquiring language even more so, though as a baby we are able to learn our mother language (and a second or a third if your parents slash school are ambitious enough) easily. Our vocabulary with meaning attached to each word is called semantics.

From early on in life we learn certain words are related to certain objects. That big man bent over your crib is called dad and the woman delivering your bottle of milk is called mum. That fluffy brown thing on its four legs at your home is called a dog. When you reach the age of 6 you start to learn how to write these words. Now you know the fluffy brown things on its four legs at your home is written with a D, an O and a G. And when you see the letters D O G you may think of the fluffy brown things on its four legs at your home.

You just learned by mutual entailment. Learning the fluffy brown thing on its four legs at your home is written as D O G automatically creates the link leading the other way around. When A is related to B, B is simultaneously related to A.

It is like the well-known classical conditioning of Pavlovian dogs. Continuously paired to objects will lead to relating one to the other. For dogs it wouldn't work to pair a word with an object (it won't start salivating after a while when hearing "bone" repeatedly), but for humans it does! Though bones probably won't make you salivate either, you can learn to relate the word bone to the physical object and the picture of the skeleton tissue thingy.

The strength of a relationship

Let's make it somewhat more difficult. What if you have three objects? Let's say you have me (being a spectacled boy for now), my dad (Rupert) and my brother (Leroy). Learning Leroy is my brother automatically creates the link of me being a brother to Leroy as well. Learning Rupert is my dad automatically creates the link of me being his son. And above all, another relation is established: Leroy being Ruperts son and Rupert being Leroys father. Knowing A is B and A is C automatically leads to knowing B is C.

This is called combinatorial entailment. Both mutual and combinatorial entailment are concepts part of the Relational Frame Theory. Learning by relating words to meanings and objects and the other way around happens unconscious, through relational framing. Linking two objects to each other and through this assigning meaning to other objects as well, is what RET refers to as transformation of function.

When language goes wrong

RET goes further than explaining the process of learning a language. It is just as me thinking about why a table is called a table, and a chair a chair. The ability to think and use language makes us vulnerable. In contrast to animals, we humans tend to think too much. We start to create links that are less profitable. Like when you start to relate feelings of anxiety to just hearing about dogs. This may happen when you have once been bitten by a dog, but also when you just heard of someone being attacked by the animal. Even just thinking of dogs may give you the shivers.

Also language can create depression. Thinking "I am worthless" creates negative feelings about yourself and makes you feel depressive, and, indeed, worthless.

Unbelievable how something as common and automatic as language can be this influential in life. On the other hand, why would something as common and automatic as language not be this influential? It is the one thing that separates us from animals and other living creatures, and we are the only ones ending up with disorders and such.

Every benefit has its cost?